


Carrying the Bat

by athousandwinds



Category: Chronicles of Chrestomanci - Jones
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-01-26
Updated: 2010-01-26
Packaged: 2017-10-06 17:39:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/56180
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/athousandwinds/pseuds/athousandwinds
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"To carry the bat: an opener who is not out at the end of the innings is said to have done this." Millie is trying to deal with a petitioner. Christopher isn't in the mood.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Carrying the Bat

> "…the English man is seen at his best the moment that another man throws a ball at him. He is then seen to be neither spiteful, nor vindictive, nor mean, nor querulous, nor desirous of taking an unfair advantage; he is seen to be law-abiding, and to respect the regulations which he himself generally has made; he takes it for granted that his adversary will respect them likewise; he would be profoundly shocked by any attempt to cheat; his scorn would be as much aroused by any exultation displayed by the victor as by any ill-temper displayed by the loser."- Vita Sackville-West, _The Character of England_  
> 

 

The sun was high in the sky and Millie tilted her head away from it to look at the players on the green lawn, freshly-mowed for the occasion. They seemed so cool and calm in their whites, strolling between the wickets with lackadaisical savoir-faire, and then one would turn, or raise his hand, and one could discern the greyish sweat patches on his shirt. Still, they made a pretty picture for a postcard, the type of thing that had "A Present From Penzance" stamped in the corner and a wag scribbling on the back, "Wish you were here instead of me". They personified the sort of quaint England everyone talked about nostalgically but which no one could actually remember, even here in the cricket pavilion.

People like Mr Pascoe, for example. He was polite, she thought, if he did have a very odd moustache, and if he ever would stop talking about the rape of England's green fields and the evils of thaumic industrialisation.

"Goodness," she said dutifully as he described a machine which was meant to improve mining but which sucked away all the magic in the vicinity to do so. "It _does_ sound like a dragon." Only much cheaper. Michael had been complaining about the price of dragon's blood at breakfast that morning, what a strange coincidence.

"It's not as if I could – or would, I might add – bleed a live dragon," he'd said, nodding vaguely in the direction of his workroom. How he imagined dragon blood was usually obtained was currently beyond Millie, lulled by the pleasant summer afternoon. Not a bit like her home world, where one couldn't get away with only a dress in cream and cartwheel hat to match.

Once they had entertained the King to tea. It had been almost comical how put out he was when Christopher was called away, and Roger had been no help, intoning unexpectedly: "Somewhere, there is a crime happening."

"Thank you, Roger," she'd said. "I'm sure His Majesty isn't interested in the minutiae of the Chrestomanci's daily grind."

On that occasion, she'd managed to soothe His Majesty's wounded feelings, partly with heartfelt sympathy (it really was too _bad_ of Christopher) and partly through judicious application of the Living Asheth's hauteur (because it was hardly _Christopher's_ fault). Then Christopher had returned from Five B dripping wet and in a filthy mood, ruining all her hard work, but after all, it wasn't as if the King could complain about Christopher doing his job. As for herself, she'd learnt to live with these things. She'd been so proud of him after the few heart-stopping seconds when she thought he was genuinely hurt, so proud that she'd choked on what she meant to say. Which, unfortunately, had given Christopher a moment of grace to open his mouth and let loose a stream of sarcasm at poor Michael.

But one accepted these foibles for the pleasure of living with Christopher, of living as vicariously through his personality as through novels, of living with someone who didn't blink an eye at either Millie's occasional silliness (that was to say, perhaps more than occasional) or the Goddess's scornful pride. The sort of person who could make one laugh and cry in quick succession.

"I myself have high-grade mines in Newcastle-upon-Tyne," said Mr Pascoe. Good grief, did anyone but newspaper journalists call it that? "We hit an _extremely_ rich seam of coal only last week."

"Remember that awful rubbish you used to read, Millie?" Christopher had murmured one night, the night before her twenty-sixth birthday. That had been the year of miners' strikes in Newcastle. "All about that fathead Millie and her friend Angela Folkestone and a lot of soppy girls doing stupid things."

She'd poked him in the belly but not hard, because she was sleepy. "Much better than _cricket_."

"We're clearly incompatible," Christopher had muttered into her hair. "I propose a divorce. In the morning."

"In the morning," she'd agreed. And in the morning she'd opened her bedside table and she'd found a first edition hardback of _Millie at St Andrews_, which had only ever been printed the once because the publishers at the time thought such a popular heroine going to university set a bad moral example. She'd searched the worlds for a copy.

So now she was here, watching a man in stained white trousers bowl a perfect ball at the stumps, watching another man attempt to block it with his leg, watching Christopher cry out, "LBW!"

"LBW!" called out the umpire in response. Christopher cast a longing look at the batsman, but sat down next to her anyway.

"Dalziel's a rotten cheat," he said. In other matters, he might have forgiven him, but cricket was _serious_.

"Never mind," Millie said, rearranging her dress with serenity. "You remember Mr Pascoe?" She positioned the sharp heel of her shoe by his toe in case he didn't.

"Certainly," Christopher said, looking utterly blank. "Sorry I'm late, small problem in Eight E."

"Oh?" Mr Pascoe inquired politely.

"Minor war," Christopher said, for once laconic. "One side had hold of some nasty battle spells which I wouldn't use if I were begged." His hands were shaking, but only slightly. Millie poured him some iced tea and set it down in front of him. To prevent him from picking it up and exposing himself, she took his hand, lacing their fingers together.

"Mr Pascoe's been telling me about some of the factories in Leeds," she said. "He has some concerns about their power source."

She felt, rather than saw, Christopher stiffen.

"It's some very complex spellwork," Christopher said. "I don't see my way to interfering with the pro-thaumic bill, quite frankly, Mr – ah – Pastel. It's safer than shovelling coal and cleaner than the smoke snorting out of most places."

Millie held back a sigh. It was too much to ask of Christopher not to be rude to people he disliked, it really was. She considered several methods of revenge, including short-sheeting his bed; sadly, she recalled, they shared one. Asking for silver fillings at the dentist was too dangerous. A beetle down the neck during Sunday service? Perhaps. Millie still shuddered at the memory of Jason doing it to her.

"The real question here, I think," Christopher said, his eyes dark and sharp for a split second before he turned vague, "is why you came here in person to plead your case, when a letter would have sorted out the whole matter satisfactorily."

"Mr Pascoe," Millie said gently, "how are your mines? The ones in Newcastle."

"Very well, thank you," Mr Pascoe said waspishly. "If you have nothing else to say on the matter – "

"I don't," said Christopher.

" – then I have no more business here. Good afternoon, Lady Chant."

Millie rose to see him away from the pavilion, returning to find Christopher intent upon the cricket. "It's the thirty-third over, Millie," he said. "The first innings should be finished soon. They're putting Marsden into bat."

"What a lovely vote of confidence," Millie said. "I hope he didn't hear you."

"I hope he did," Christopher said, his tone rather grim.

Marsden was indeed bowled out in short order. Millie watched as the batsmen and fielders switched places and started throwing balls at each other against. It was a charming sight, like the Dance of the Sugar Plum Fairy. It was even relaxing. It was simply not, to her mind, something that commanded attention. "Is our side going to win?"

"Four hundred and forty-five for ten," Christopher said, his heart and mind fifty feet away and his voice almost automatic. "Williams scored a century not out, he's far too good for that team. Yes, our side will win, barring unforeseen calamity."

"Oh, are our side the ones batting now?"

Christopher spared enough concentration to shoot her an annoyed glance. Millie blinked at him and reminded herself that it could be worse. She had read of golfing widows and at least the cricket season only came round once a year, and she could prepare accordingly. She took out a book. It wasn't a particularly good book, more candyfloss than coq au vin, but it _was_ exciting, which was all Millie asked for in an alternative to cricket.

"It would be a very clever method of killing someone, wouldn't it?" she inquired some minutes into the tenth over. The bowler had just thrown a weak no-ball, aimed at the batsman's head more in frustration than with precision. "It could so easily be an accident."

Christopher favoured her with a startled look, and then a glare. "No one would dream of it."

Millie could think of quite a few people who could and would dream of it, herself included.

Eventually, the players elected to pull up stumps: partly because the afternoon light was fading, partly because Christopher's team had already scored four hundred for six and the opposition were not interested in completing their humiliation. Millie waved them goodbye as they went to change, then slipped her arm through Christopher's.

"Wasn't that wonderful?" she asked brightly and not at all sarcastically. Christopher, looking exasperated (for a given value of "exasperated", allowing for Christopher's quirks of facial expression), said:

"You needn't come if you'll be bored."

"Never," Millie said cheerfully. "Not when the alternative is sitting in the drawing room watching the new paint dry on the walls."

"Millie," Christopher said, then, stumbling a little like he always did over endearments, he added, "darling."

"It's not my birthday, Christopher," Millie said. "You needn't go to so much trouble, you know."

Christopher looked well-bred and inarticulate, staring down his long, aquiline nose at her. Millie squeezed his arm. "Feeling better, dearest?"

"Much."

Some things were necessary. Millie understood this in the way she had in her childhood, when she'd realised why tales of the outside were so important for her to listen to. People needed an escape, whether into books or stamp collections or, in Christopher's case, cricket. A world where the rules were clear, if complicated, where fair play and sportsmanship always won the day. Intruders were not welcome: Christopher ran off anyone who disturbed him here; Millie had dreamed up a hundred plagues of vengeance on That Girl who'd borrowed _Millie, Captain of the School_ and returned it with pages missing.

Some things were necessary. Millie knew she would hear about the war in Eight E tonight, whether Christopher told her or not; he would mutter in his sleep and she would lie awake listening. But he wouldn't wake screaming.

Some things were necessary. Millie leant her head against Christopher's shoulder, a comfort for both of them.

"Let's go home," she said, and wondered if she could get up an impromptu match on the village green tomorrow morning.


End file.
